


Not *this* socially awkward all the time

by noxelementalist



Category: Power Rangers Lightspeed Rescue, Power Rangers Time Force
Genre: Date Night, Fluff and Humor, Gen, Getting Together, M/M, Mentors, Multi, Slice of Life, mini-golf
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-03
Updated: 2019-10-03
Packaged: 2020-11-22 09:54:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,375
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20872280
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/noxelementalist/pseuds/noxelementalist
Summary: In which Eric Myers isn’t sure what’s happening and Chad Lee won’t sacrifice date night





	Not *this* socially awkward all the time

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Rivulet027](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rivulet027/gifts).

> Written for Rivulet027 as part of the Fandom Growth Exchange 2019. Hope you love it!
> 
> Spoilers: set in the immediate aftermath of the PRTF episode "Time for Lightspeed"

_Silver Hills man, _Chad thought to himself. _Can’t wait to leave this place behind._

The former- _Current? Commander Mitchell never did say what “reserve status” meant_\- Blue Lightspeed Rescue Ranger had driven into Silver Hills along with the rest of his former teammates when they’d heard that Vypra had returned to menace the city.

The drive in alone had been his first sign that something was up with the place. There had been a near endless amount of office space. Chad figured the silver in Silver Hills must’ve helped to bring it all about once upon a time, but there were also almost no suburbs. No houses really, as if nobody actually lived there, just commuted in from the boatload of townhouses and apartment smashed together around the outskirts of town like a faux concrete barrier reef.

Also, there hadn’t been a major body of water nearby. Not a river, or even a lake, just a run of retention ponds. Not that he was expecting something huge like Mariner Bay, but there wasn’t even a visible _coastline _from the roadway, and that was just wrong. Ryan might’ve said otherwise and teased Chad about his need for water, but Ryan hadn’t driven in with Chad, so Chad wouldn’t know until they got home what his boyfriend really thought.

“You want me to help you do _what,” _a male voice said loudly some distance away from behind Chad.

“Look, I know it’s kinda weird, but—”

_What is that? _Chad thought, turning away from where he’d been standing by his car and moving towards where he thought he could hear the voices coming from, which turned out to be from around the front of the Clock Tower that was the new Ranger base.

The Tower, much like the town, was also a place the new Rangers seemed to love that Chad wasn’t fond of. At least on the Aquabase he had had a private room and a mess hall to eat in, and the lack of it made Chad twitchy. He _still_ had occasional nightmares from the one (and only) time he ever had tried to talk to Carter before his morning coffee on the Aquabase.

It hadn’t gone well, to say the least.

“Because if you think I’m going to _force_ someone to—”

“_Ryan_!” the other voice shouted.

_Looks like trouble. _“Is everything okay?” Chad asked aloud as he reached the door that opened to the _Nick of Time Odd Jobs_ _Store_ located on the first flower of the Tower, opening the door to the shop to see Ryan Mitchell leaning away from the counter in the shop room, brown eyes flashing with annoyance.

“Chad, this guy,” Ryan said, shifting enough for Chad to see him point a thumb at the green-haired young man Chad had just learned was the new Green Ranger, “wants me to help his team hook Eric into an orgy with them.”

“Not an orgy!” the green-haired man (_Trip_, Chad remembered belatedly) hissed. “A _relationship_. A multi-partner, polyamorous _relationship_.”

“Orgy,” Ryan repeated. “That’s- that’s called an orgy. That’s what we called it growing up. Isn’t that what you called it growing up Chad?”

“I…think I missed a few key points in this conversation,” Chad said carefully, glancing between the two of them as he shuffled closer to the counter.

“Never mind,” Trip muttered. The younger ranger crossed his arms, the gesture making Chad notice just how large Joel’s jacket hung on him. “I just thought he might have some ideas about how to, you know—”

“Ask someone out on a date?” Chad offered.

“Sorta?” Trip said. “He _is_ a Sixth ranger like Eric is…”

“Yeah, no, you want me for that.”

“Excuse me?” Ryan said, sounding offended.

“Babe, I love you, but you grew up among _actual demons_,” Chad pointed out to the former Titanium Ranger. “I don’t care what they called six people in a relationship. Demonic courting rituals aren’t going to be helpful for anyone here.”

“You _liked_ my demonic courting rituals.”

“Once I realized that’s what they _were.”_

“He what?” Trip asked confused.

Chad sighed. “I know my boyfriend here looks like your standard green-eyed, fair spiky-haired surfer hottie,” Chad told him, “but the truth is he was kidnapped by a demon—”

“—I wasn’t _kidnapped_,” Ryan grumbled, “I was _given away_—”

“—_negotiated away under duress to a demon, _where he spent all of his childhood learning how to kill people,” Chad continued smoothly. “This messed with things like learning how to invite someone you’d like into a relationship on a date.”

“But he’s dating you, so he must’ve done something right?” Trip said.

“What I did right was love him,” Ryan stated. “Enough to keep trying until he figured out what I was trying to do.”

“And, fortunately for him, once I realized what he was trying to do, the part where he slaughtered Batlings in my name, stalked me down the Aquabase halls at night—”

“—I was _trying _to _protect_—”

“—giving me flowers that were _obviously_ taken from a funeral home, serving extra burnt slices on pizza day to the cafeteria worker who shortchanged me, and trying to sharpen my surfboard into a weapon all turned out to be kind of adorable,” Chad continued. “So after I was put on the Reserves list and got settled into being a professional lifeguard, I wrote him a letter asking him to come over to my place for dinner with the excuse of getting him off-base and away from his family.”

“Then I paid for breakfast to get delivered the next morning,” Ryan said smugly.

“And we’ve been together ever since,” Chad concluded.

“…so he wouldn’t know how to ask a guy like Eric out,” Trip replied.

“No, not really,” Chad said. “But maybe we can help. What does he like?”

“...arguing with Wes?” Trip said shyly, his green hair tilting away from his face as he looked at the pair.

“Huh?”

“He works with the Silver Guardians security force,” Trip explained, “and our hours don’t line up right, so we don’t get to see him that much. Mostly it’s around fight times, which is a real bummer.”

“Okay, so maybe you all don’t know too much about what would get his attention, but there’s probably some kind of standard for asking folks out that people have here right?” Ryan insisted. “Eric didn’t seem _that_ stupid to me on the drive in, he’d probably figure out what you’re doing if you did it right.”

“How did you wind up driving in with him anyway?” Chad asked.

“I grabbed him at a security checkpoint and threw him into the backseat.”

“What.”

“Hey, it _worked_, didn’t it?”

Chad sighed. “_Is _there a standard here?” he asked Trip, deciding to revisit the part where his boyfriend had kidnapped his successor once the two of them had safely returned to Mariner Bay.

Trip shrugged. “We’re from the future,” Trip answered. “We’re not really sure how you’d do that for someone like Eric. Wes tried asking him out for coffee, but it only seemed to get Eric more annoyed with him. We could hear the yelling a block away.”

“Coffee is sort of a first flirt thing, maybe Eric thought he was—” Chad began.

“Lucas tried dinner,” Trip continued. “And that almost worked! He got to go to Eric’s house out in the suburbs—”

‘Wait, people _live _here?” Ryan interrupted.

“_Right_?” Chad said to his boyfriend. “I thought it was one of those work town only places.”

“What kind of person would- wait, no, we’ll come back to the insanity of that later,” Ryan said. “How’d Lucas do?”

“Not as well as you did I’m guessing,” Chad said.

“Nothing happened,” Trip confirmed, shrugging. “Lucas was so _sad_. Said it was the first time in years that a guy’s invited him home for dinner and nothing else. Though he did seem kinda happy to see it? Eric apparently has a really nice place,” he added thoughtfully. “One floor, lots of bedrooms. Nice backyard. It’s large enough we could all move in if we wanted. Not-not that that’s why we’d want to date him or anything!”

“It’s cool, I can see why a place that could fit six Rangers privately would be a plus for you,” Ryan told the Green Ranger.

“The others?” Chad asked. “Did Katie or, ugh, what’s your pink’s name—”

“Jen can’t get any time alone with him to try,” Trip answered, “and Katie’d rather be courted than do the courting?”

“And you don’t know how to make a move,” Chad finished.

“…I just want to hug him,” Trip said softly. “He- Eric seems really cuddly.”

_Oh Neptune_, Chad thought. _He’s a cuddler._

“So basically we have two guys he can’t take a hint from, two girls he’s blocked off before they can do anything, and you,” Ryan was muttering aloud, his fingers tapping on the countertop as he counted. “Guess we’re going to have to do this the mandatory fun time way.”

“I mean, you don’t have to—” Trip said hurriedly.

“Babe, we’re now a party of ten for tonight,” Ryan interrupted, turning to Chad. “I’ll go loop in Carter and Dana.”

“What’s happening?” Trip asked Chad as Ryan walked off.

Chad sighed. “Trip,” he said, running his hand through his no-longer regulation short cut hair. “You all are officially invited to mini-golf.”

***

Back when they had first started dating, Chad and Ryan had quickly run into a problem. Namely, where on _Earth _to go out on a date.

It wasn’t that Mariner Bay didn’t have its attractions. Angel Grove Digest constantly ranked it number #1 for best nightlife in the region. Mariners weren’t particularly against the idea of two grown men going out on a date. Mostly because the impact of being repeatedly attacked by _actual demons_ screaming about how they were going to conquer all humanity was that Mariners weren’t fond of additional hate crime, and _especially_ if that hate was directed against the Rangers who had stopped said demons. And Chad knew he and Ryan were still pretty athletic looking even now that they weren’t constantly on active duty, so he was pretty sure they didn’t come off as easy targets. Their ability to spend afternoons walking around, holding hands and kissing, in broad daylight on the boardwalk was pretty sure— a development that Ryan had _enthusiastically _been on board with, much to Chad’s own personal delight.

But the truth was that except for that first night, the two of them hadn’t spent much time together. Ryan had only stayed on the Aquabase with the rest of the Rangers a few days before leaving to deal with his cursed tattoo— thankfully, because even Chad could admit to himself that it had looked tacky as all get out— and getting back just barely in time for their final showdown with Queen Bansheera. And Chad had spent most of his time since their Rangering was over at the beach, and as much as he loved walking along the boardwalk, he wasn’t going to annoy the other lifeguards by flaunting Ryan at them (much, anyway).

They’d tried the movies, but going out didn’t make much sense when you could put the movie you weren’t going to be really watching on the TV screen in your own home for way less and with _way_ more room to make out. Concerts were nice, but not regular or private enough for Ryan, who’d spent the first half of the set with his arms around Chad’s waist and his hands in Chad’s pants, and the second half glaring at the guy seated to their left for trying to grind against him—a temptation Chad understood but hadn’t forgiven easily.

[And okay, _maybe_ it hadn’t been necessary to “accidentally” knock the guy unconscious, but it had made Ryan smile and security hadn’t thrown them out, so it was worth it in the end.]

Ryan had, surprisingly, invited Chad to a coffee shop. Chad thought he’d been hoping that maybe meeting in a bright, open-space would lead to more time talking and actually dating, but instead they’d wound up leaving after it was clear the barista wanted way more than Chad’s drink order.

It had all come to a head when Chad had decided to invite Ryan to go with him to a Halloween party one of the lifeguards had been throwing. Chad had _thought_ they’d show up for thirty minutes before leaving, because it was basically his version of an office party and even he knew how much Ryan hated having to fake being nice, but he’d been wrong. Instead, Chad had been confronted by a Ryan who’d shown up smirking at him and wrapped flatteringly up in tight black jeans and a leather jacket.

Ryan had taken one look at Chad in his board shirts and lifeguard tee and happily informed a costumed Carter (who was wearing a sexy fireman costume) and Dana (dressed in faded scrubs) that they didn’t have to worry, he was only a devil in the sack these days, and there’d be no need to chaperone them.

Which was true, Chad had admitted to himself at the time, but it wasn’t something Chad had wanted Ryan to boast about in front of his _little_ _sister_. Dana had already pulled Chad aside for the most detailed male-kink sex talk Chad had _never_ wanted to receive, and had taken Ryan’s statement with a look suggesting she was already mentally outlining a follow-up.

_[“Babe,” Chad had murmured much, much later that night in bed as he curled around Ryan, “not that I’m complaining, but we have _got_ to find a way to hang out that doesn’t result in sexy-times.”_

_“Do we now?” Ryan had replied back. His voice had been warm and teasing, his hands running just firmly enough down the line of Chad’s back for Chad to feel a very well-pleasured part of himself twitch with interest. “I kinda like it always ending that way.”_

_“I know, but I am just greedy enough to want to show you off in public with your clothes _on_, and just selfish enough to not get another sex ed talk from your sister.”_

_Ryan had sighed. “Fine,” he had muttered, shifting to lie back in their bed, the motion letting Chad make out the outline of Ryan’s abs in the moonlight. “What do you think is the least sexy, most socially respectable, but still really fun_,_ hangout place out there that we haven’t already tried out?”]_

The answer had turned out to be mini-golf.

***

“Sorry about crashing your date night,” Wes whispered to Chad at the eighth hole.

“It’s not technically date night yet,” Chad replied back to him, absently tucking a bang of hair behind his ear. “Notice that the sun’s still up.”

“Yeah, but still, our bad,” Wes said.

_Not as bad as this being the only mini-golf in a twenty minute driving _range, Chad thought. The Silver Mines Mini-Golf had eighteen holes wrapped around a course that claimed to be a “historical trip through the Silver Hills Mines,” complete with overturned mini carts, a giant dinosaur fossil, fake silver streams, and a small mining tower in place of a windmill as a final décor touch. The place was mostly filled with small families who tried to get their kids to hit the balls instead of steal them or wander off.

Chad wasn’t sure that the addition of two teams of Power Rangers made it any better. They’d been there close to a half hour, and it had felt like another eternity that him and Wes had been standing near the eighth hole for a while as they watched Lucas, the new team Blue, try to line up his shot.

It had been long enough for Chad to adjust to the sight of seeing a Red leader with brown hair and a broader build than his- and a Blue whose rank was…unclear, but who clearly was more metrosexual than Chad had ever been- wearing their team jackets out in public.

“I swear,” Wes continued, “we wouldn’t _normally_, it’s just—”

“Hey, my boyfriend wants to make sure his successor is happy and has amorously fulfilling relationships,” Chad said. “I get that. I want that for mine too.”

“Oh believe me, I _am_,” Lucas said as he stood up, pulling the blue golf putter in his hand slightly back before hitting the ball. “I’d just be happier if I could be dating _all_ the people I want to date, the way I want to date them, right now.”

“He’s greedy, but I love that about him,” Wes said as they watched the ball roll right up to the edge of the hall in the path, but not tip in.

“It’s a blue trait, honestly,” Chad said.

“Really?” Lucas asked as he approached and swapped places with Wes, who stepped forward to where his own red ball had rested on the path.

Chad nodded. “The last blue before me, Kai? He was _really_ explicit about what he planned to do with his team Red the last time we talked.”

“That’s the one on the Terra Venture colony ship, right?” Wes asked as he swung at the ball. “I remember hearing about that launching.”

“Yeah,” Chad said. “And according to Kai, the Angel Grove Blue, Billy? He went to live on an alien planet to be with his girlfriend. She was Aquitaran.”

“Actual alien girlfriend,” Lucas said thoughtfully. “I _approve_. Wonder what that’s like, but I approve.”

“If she’s anything like the earth mermaid princess girlfriend I…almost had, probably really sweet,” Chad said as he stepped forward.

“…I have so many questions now,” Wes told him as they swapped places.

“Blues man,” Lucas teased. “We can get it.”

“Except for broody sixth rangers huh?” Chad said back to him, causing the other two to moan aloud.

“You don’t- don’t even _know_ all things we have planned Eric,” Wes grumbled. “We have _plans_ for that man.”

“Detailed plans,” Lucas added. “Wes has wanted to date him since high school.”

“It’s true,” Wes confirmed when Chad glanced at him. “I’ve known him since boarding school. We used to spar with each other.”

“Just spar?”

“It was unfair getting manhandled by him, but someone had to be.”

“Wes’s got, like, a list of 30 things he wants to try out,” Lucas said.

“Do any of them involve banging him in your old high school dorm room,” Chad asked, hitting his black ball smoothly between where the other two balls lay, causing his ball to fall into the hole at the end of the track with a gentle clinking sound.

“…31,” Wes answered. “Make that a list of 31.”

“We could do one a day for a whole month,” Lucas said thoughtfully.

“That’s terrifying,” Chad told them as he went to pick up his ball. “What are you going to do, just, grab the whole month of October or something?”

“Yes,” Lucas said smoothly. “I _like_ that idea.”

“Only if we get him though,” Wes told him.

“Oh we will. We will.”

“Sorry we’re late,” a voice said, a voice that turned out to belong to Carter, who came jogging over to them. “Traffic is way worse here than in Mariner Bay. What I miss?”

“These two have decided that they’re going to turn October into a month-long date once they can rope Eric,” Chad said flatly.

Carter nodded. “Dana, Kelsey, Katie, and Jenn have pretty much decided the same thing on the drive over. They’ve got a list and everything.”

“You spent the _whole_ drive on this?” Chad asked, moving out of the way as Carter dropped a white golf ball on the course.

“Dana gave them protection information.”

“That’s—”

“Very sweet,” Lucas told interrupted. “Thank her for us, because that list we have definitely could benefit from that.”

“Sounded like it,” Carter said as he lined up. “How’d you come up with that list anyway?”

“Jenn has conflict management training and we have a lot of time,” Wes told him. “We negotiated.”

“Well enough that Circuit told us we should run for Congress,” Lucas added.

“That’s the owl, right?” Carter asked Chad as he hit the ball, causing it hit Lucas’ ball in.

“Yes, and way to start off with a negative score,” Chad replied.

***

“Eighteen Holes,” Chad grumbled. “Eighteen. Holes.”

“So it’s taking a little longer than we expected,” Carter said soothingly, patting Chad on the shoulder. “We knew going in that this was a possibility.”

“_Still_. How could he be that oblivious?”

“You were with Ryan.”

“Ryan was _not_ as obvious as these five,” Chad said pointedly.

The two men were standing at the eighteenth hole, waiting for Teams Green and AV Cord— a name Chad was only forty percent sure Ryan hadn’t thought up— to join Teams Blue and Valentine for one last round to see who’d win the game.

They weren’t in much of a rush. The game had gone smoothly, but as they played their way around an artificial Silver Hills, the slow pace had only given Chad more proof of how incredibly bad the Time Force Rangers were at declaring their intentions. Wes and Lucas flirted and mumbled dirtily under their breath at Eric every time they saw him bend even slightly from across the course, but would keep their eyes firmly off Eric’s ass and their mouths shut the second the Quantum Ranger turned around to look at them. Jen kept trying to start conversation with Eric, but wasn’t able to budge him into even small talk without Eric constantly glancing between her and Wes every time she said anything slightly flirty. Katie had ignored him entirely, while Trip stared fondly at Eric the entire time.

The end result was Chad staring at his boyfriend, Eric, Kelsey, and Katie slowly work their way up the course as Joel and Trip played one hole in front of them, and everyone else started sitting on the abandoned mining carts to wait them out, with most of Time Force watching Eric play at the same time.

It was slow going. Even the sun had started nearing the horizon.

_Am I really going to give up date night for this? _Chad thought to himself.

It didn’t take long to realize the answer.

“That’s it, I’m taking desperate action,” Chad said aloud. “Yo Eric!”

“Chad, I really don’t think—”

“What?” Eric shouted back, causing a few other players to glare at him.

“Wait, is Mister Strong and Silent seriously—”

“Quick Chat by the Dino right now!” Chad said, walking over there before he could see if Eric followed.

“And yeah he’s doing this,” he heard Carter say as he walked away from him.

Eric and Chad arrived almost at the same time to the giant dinosaur fossil on the thirteenth hole.

"Alright, now you've got me, with a…badly-sketched T-rex thing as a witness." Eric said to him, glaringly at the giant dinosaur behind them. “What is it?"

"Look, normally I wouldn't bother saying this, because I feel everyone has the right to do things their own way."

"Well—"

"But seeing as how my boyfriend has decided to intervene on your behalf," Chad told him, "and this match it about to last long enough to wreck our date night, allow me to be blunt. Your Team wants to date you."

"...what."

"All of them. They want you. For themselves."

"Like-like _sexually_?"

"Wes and Lucas do, absolutely. They went into explicit detail about that,” Chad told him. “They’ve got plans for the whole month of October."

"For the love of—"

"Jen and Katie seem unsure if they want in on that or just to watch it happen, but they helped make the plans, so probably both," Chad continued. "And Trip wants to cuddle. A lot."

"That-I can't- what am I supposed to _do_ with this?" Eric asked, sounding confused.

Chad sighed. "Well, if you're anything like Ryan, I imagine step one would be to walk away from me and proceed to the nearest desert wasteland for months," he said. "But that—"

"Wait. _Wait_. Wes asking me out for coffee, and Lucas asking me to dinner- were those—"

"Attempts at a seduction? Yes."

"I. Wow."

"Yeah,” Chad said. “And I gotta say, seeing you play tonight while they’re all eying you like they want to eat you alive makes me think they should’ve written a note saying that in advance, but here we are."

For a brief moment the pair fell silent, the sounds of people hitting multicolored balls with gulf clubs to varying degrees of enjoyable success echoing around them.

"Okay, so, new plan," Eric said abruptly. "You distract your boyfriend, I'm going to finish off the next three holes, and then drag my apparently new _cluster_ of significant others back to my house—"

"Good plan. I like this plan."

"—where," Eric went on, "I will be having _very lengthy discussions_ with everyone about how to _never do this again_."

"...so that's a no?"

"That- of course _not_! Have you seen them?" Eric asked.

"Well yeah, but you seem to hate everyone?"

Eric rolled his eyes. "I may hate people, but I don't hate them so much that when an entire team of highly athletic, smart, demanding, and mostly emotionally stable people want me I'd turn them down. Run them through an inkblot test, sure, but they can't all be crazy."

Chad blinked. "Right," he said slowly. "Good luck then?"

"Thanks," Eric said as he turned to stroll around.

“So that seemed to go pretty well from what I could see,” Carter said as Chad approached him. “What happened?”

“He’s going to finish out the match and then take his new team cluster home with him,” Chad told the former Red Lightspeed Ranger, “where he intends to begin dating them all by informing them how to _not_ let things get to this point.”

Carter blinked rapidly. “So we’re heading home in like ten minutes aren’t we.”

“Yes, yes we are.”

“Awesome,” Carter replied. “Then you and Ryan can do date night proper, and Dana and I can head out to not golf things.”

Chad grinned. “Exactly,” he said, and with that the two men sat down on the course, watching as the Quantum Ranger grabbed his putter and began to swing.


End file.
